Tag Archives: CityLab

Confusion to Trump’s E.O.?

Posted on November 27, 2020 by David Brussat

“Confusion to Boney” was a toast raised by the British Navy in the Napoleonic era. No doubt “Confusion to Trump’s E.O.” is a toast raised today by modernists fearful of the president’s draft executive order favoring classical styles for federal … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 27 Comments

Modern architecture is crazy

Posted on January 28, 2018 by David Brussat

Among the most recent revelations of science in the service of architecture is that three of the most eminent founders of modern architecture suffered from mental illness. Le Corbusier was on the autism spectrum while Walter Gropius and Ludwig Mies … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 8 Comments

Your brain on architecture

Posted on April 19, 2016 by David Brussat

Here’s another scientific study about architecture. Look through the methodology and your eyeballs may roll furiously at its conclusion that “contemplative” buildings cause contemplative activity in the brain. Showing pictures of such buildings (old and new) to a dozen architects … Continue reading →

Posted in Architects, Architecture, Architecture Education, Architecture History, Art and design, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

“Reinvent” (destroy) Paris

Posted on February 9, 2016 by David Brussat

Here is the Reinventing Paris video displaying, in quick succession, the 23 finalists for 23 development sites in a contest sponsored by the municipality under Mayor Anne Hidalgo. The text is in French, and I cannot therefore reconcile why it refers … Continue reading →

Posted in Architects, Architecture, Architecture Education, Architecture History, Art and design, Development, Preservation, Providence, Urbanism and planning, Video | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Brutalism’s heroic ugliness

Posted on December 30, 2015 by David Brussat

Hats off to Jo-Anne Peck for sending to TradArch this amazing article, “In Memoriam: Important Buildings We Lost in 2015,” by Kriston Capps, a staff writer for CityLab. Quoth Peck: “I don’t see any I would miss.” Right on, Jo-Anne! … Continue reading →

Posted in Architects, Architecture, Architecture Education, Architecture History, Art and design, Preservation, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Skyscraper vs. skyscraper

Posted on November 16, 2015 by David Brussat

Hats off to Kristen Richards of ArchNewsNow.com for publishing a denunciation by CityLab of the (Toronto) Globe & Mail’s critic Eric Reguly’s piece “Why skyscrapers are killing great cities.” Otherwise we might not have seen the latter essay, which flies … Continue reading →

Posted in Architects, Architecture, Architecture Education, Architecture History, Art and design, Development, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Misconstruing “starchitect”

Posted on November 3, 2015 by David Brussat

Kriston Capps’s piece for CityLab, “Leave Starchitects Alone,” is filled with so much hooey that I am embarrassed to be inflicting it on my readers. It is part of the continuing effort to tar opposition to modern architecture as partisan … Continue reading →

Posted in Architects, Architecture, Architecture History, Art and design, Books and Culture, Development, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 5 Comments

Fie on a million years!

Posted on October 18, 2015 by David Brussat

For his latest piece in CityLab, “Making the Case for Symmetrical Cities,” peripatetic architecture critic Anthony Flint, housed at the Lincoln Institute in Cambridge, does a very nice job adding up the evidence for the superiority of classical and traditional … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Architecture Education, Architecture History, Art and design, Books and Culture, Urbanism and planning | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments